News stories tagged with "hydrofracking"

(02/23/12) A judge in Cortland County has upheld the Tomkins county town of Dryden's ban on gas drilling within its borders. As the Innovation Trail's Matt Richmond reports, this is just the first step in what could be a long process. more

(01/26/12) The Department of Energy has drastically reduced its estimate for natural gas reserves in the Marcellus Shale. The Innovation Trail's Matt Richmond reports. more

(01/24/12) Hundreds of anti-hydrofracking protesters were at the State Capitol Monday, in one of the largest demonstrations against the natural gas drilling process so far. In Albany, Karen DeWitt has the details on the protests. more

(01/13/12) The State's environmental commissioner estimates the agency has received 40,000 comments in the public comment period on proposed hydrofracking in New York, which ended Wednesday. In Albany, Karen DeWitt has the details. more

(01/12/12) The public comment period for the Cuomo administration's proposal for natural gas hydro fracking is now over. Opponents are left wishing they had more time, while supporters say they'd like to see drilling begin soon. In Albany, Karen DeWitt has more. more

(01/11/12) The state Department of Environmental Conservation has a lot of reading to do about hydrofracking. The deadline to comment about new regulations was midnight. The DEC already had more than 21,000 comments on the issue. And yesterday, both supporters and opponents of the controversial gas-drilling technique brought box after box filled with more comments. more

(01/11/12) Politics and price are pitting gas drilling against offshore wind on the Great lakes.
Our Front and Center partnership with WBEZ in Chicago looks at hopes for economic revival in the nation's rustbelt.

In the Cleveland area, politicians and businessmen have been pushing for years to build a wind farm in Lake Erie. But the project's financing is up in the air, and as WBEZ's Chip Mitchell reports, state politics is tipping the balance toward hydrofracking, and away from what could be the first major offshore wind development in the Great Lakes. more

(01/04/12) More than 100 protestors opposed to hydrofracking gathered in the Empire State Plaza Wednesday outside the auditorium where Governor Andrew Cuomo delivered his State of the State address, chanting "no fracking way!" more

(01/03/12) The gas drilling technique known as hydro-fracking has raised fears about water supplies and environmental damage. But as the Innovation Trail's Matt Richmond reports, there's a new conflict about fracking brewing: what effect will emissions from the production process have on global climate change? more

(01/03/12) Experts say exploration of natural gas in the Marcellus Shale is expected to keep rising in 2012. But they say landowners may find that signing lease deals isn't as easy as in years past.

Drillers have swarmed in recent years to the Shale that lies beneath Pennsylvania, New York, West Virginia and Ohio. Pennsylvania is the center of activity, with more than 3,000 wells drilled in the past three years and thousands more planned.

Other states are opening up to the drilling, which often entails hydrofracking. That's when drillers drill down, and then horizontally into the bedrock. They use a mix of water, sand, and chemicals under high pressure to smash open the shale and release the gas.

New York has delayed issuing regulations to allow large scale hydrofracking.

Jerry Simmons is executive director of National Association of Royalty Owners. The group represents landowners who sell their mineral rights to energy companies. He says New York property owners would already get less for a well then their neighbors in Pennsylvania did a few years ago.